Current location in this text. Enter a Perseus citation to go to another section or work. Full search
options are on the right side and top of the page.

[271]
NOW it was that Festus succeeded Felix as procurator, and made it
his business to correct those that made disturbances in the country. So
he caught the greatest part of the robbers, and destroyed a great many
of them. But then Albinus, who succeeded Festus, did not execute his office
as the other had done; nor was there any sort of wickedness that could
be named but he had a hand in it. Accordingly, he did not only, in his
political capacity, steal and plunder every one's substance, nor did he
only burden the whole nation with taxes, but he permitted the relations
of such as were in prison for robbery, and had been laid there, either
by the senate of every city, or by the former procurators, to redeem them
for money; and no body remained in the prisons as a malefactor but he who
gave him nothing. At this time it was that the enterprises of the seditious
at Jerusalem were very formidable; the principal men among them purchasing
leave of Albinus to go on with their seditious practices; while that part
of the people who delighted in disturbances joined themselves to such as
had fellowship with Albinus; and every one of these wicked wretches were
encompassed with his own band of robbers, while he himself, like an arch-robber,
or a tyrant, made a figure among his company, and abused his authority
over those about him, in order to plunder those that lived quietly. The
effect of which was this, that those who lost their goods were forced to
hold their peace, when they had reason to show great indignation at what
they had suffered; but those who had escaped were forced to flatter him
that deserved to be punished, out of the fear they were in of suffering
equally with the others. Upon the Whole, nobody durst speak their minds,
but tyranny was generally tolerated; and at this time were those seeds
sown which brought the city to destruction.

Flavius Josephus. The Works of Flavius Josephus. Translated by. William Whiston, A.M. Auburn and Buffalo. John E. Beardsley. 1895.

An XML version of this text is available for download,
with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted
changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.